PRICE TEN CENTS 


Thomas Paine 

FOREMOST 

CONSTRUCTIVE STATESMAN 
OF HIS TIME 


AN ADDRESS 

AT THE THOMAS PAINE BIRTHDAY DINNER 
NEW YORK, 1921 


BY 

HON. OSCAR S. STRAUS 

i > 

Ex-Ambassador Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to 

Turkey 

Ex-Secretary of U. S. Departments of Commerce and Labor 

Author of “Origin of the Republican Form of Government in 
the United States”; “Roger Williams, the Pioneer of Religious 
Liberty”; “The Development of Religious Liberty in the 
United States,” etc. 


PUBLISHED BY THE 

Thomas Paine National Historical Association 

NEW YORK 





Thomas Paine 

Foremost Constructive Statesman 
of His Time 

An Address by 

HON. OSCAR S. STRAUS 


At the Paine birthday banquet, held in the Cafe 
Boulevard, New York, Jan. 28, 1921, under the 
auspices of the Thomas Paine National Historical 
Association, the opening address was made by the 
Hon. Oscar S. Straus, the former secretary of the 
U. S. Department of Commerce and Labor, ex-min¬ 
ister to Turkey, and author of numerous books, 
among them “Roger Williams, the Pioneer of Re¬ 
ligious Liberty.” Mr. Straus said: 

“Governmentally no less than economically, the 
world is in an anxious period of readjustment and 



6 


THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 


reconstruction. The tremendous burden of taxa¬ 
tion the World War has imposed upon the victori¬ 
ous no less than upon the vanquished nations, has 
put a strain on all governments. Bolshevism is the 
extreme form of disintegration which that strain 
has projected and assumed. The structure of even 
the most liberal governments has been shaken, and 
a wise foresight compels a reexamination of the 
foundations of their governmental system. In this 
country it is our habit to celebrate the anniversaries 
of epoch-making events in our national history, and 
the births of the Fathers and conservers of the Re¬ 
public. We celebrate our Independence, the birth¬ 
days of Washington and Lincoln, as well as of Jef¬ 
ferson, Franklin, Jackson and others. 

“The Thomas Paine National Historical Associa¬ 
tion has rendered and is rendering a distinct patri¬ 
otic service in commemorating the anniversary of 
the birth of him whose services as the first visioned 
exponent of Independence, and one of our first, if 




Thomas paine, foremost statesman 1 


not the first, advocate and expounder of American 
representative democracy, entitles him to rank 
alongside of Washington, Franklin, Jefiferson and 
Adams as one of the Fathers of the Republic. 

“It is not my purpose, in the brief remarks I will 
make, to dwell even in outline upon the life and 
services of Thomas Paine. That has been so ad¬ 
mirably done by word and pen by Mr. van der 
Weyde, your president, and by the late Elbert Hub¬ 
bard, and John E. Remsburg and others. It was 
my good fortune to know intimately the distin¬ 
guished biographer of Paine, Moncure D. Conway, 
who has rendered a great service to the history of 
our country in writing the life and editing the works 
of Thomas Paine. 

“Paine was of humble origin and, like Franklin, 
self-educated and therefore all the more a courage¬ 
ous, original and progressive thinker and writer. It 
was due to Franklin, who recognized Paine’s ex¬ 
ceptional qualities, that the latter came to America 




8 


THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 


at the end of 1774, bearing letters of introduction 
from Franklin to several of his friends in Philadel¬ 
phia. I state this fact in view of the great services 
Paine began immediately to render, as an additional 
reason of recognition for the manifold contribu¬ 
tions, both at home and abroad, that Franklin made 
to American liberty and democracy. 

“When Paine arrived and began editing The 
Pennsylvania Magazine, and for some months 
thereafter, Independence was not thought of even 
by such leaders as Washington, Franklin and 
Adams. Even, following the battles of Lexington 
and Bunker Hill, the prevailing thought was one of 
taxation and the redress of grievances. Paine was 
the first to take a bold stand for Independence, and 
by his irresistible argument and plea in his ‘Com¬ 
mon Sense,’ he' stirred up the conscience of the 
people and won over Washington and several of 
the foremost leaders to the cause of Independence. 
Washington immediately recognized the compelling 




Thomas paine, foremost statesman 


9 


value of ‘Common Sense’ to the cause that he was 
defending with the sword. ‘Common Sense’ was 
highly praised and welcomed by Jefferson, John 
Adams, Franklin, Madison and all the patriotic 
statesmen of the time. Washington, in a letter to 
Joseph Reed shortly after the appearance of ‘Com¬ 
mon Sense,’ said: ‘A few more such flaming argu¬ 
ments as were exhibited at Falmouth and Norfolk, 
added to the sound doctrine and unanswerable rea¬ 
soning contained in the pamphlet “Common Sense,” 
will not leave numbers at a loss to decide on the 
propriety of separation.’ 

“I wish to call attention to the second chapter of 
this remarkable politico-philosophical pamphlet, the 
chapter of ‘Common Sense’ entitled ‘Of Monarchy 
and Hereditary Succession.’ I desire to do so for 
two reasons: First, because it goes to the historical 
foundation of democratic government, and secondly, 
as an evidence of Paine’s appreciation of and fa¬ 
miliarity with the Bible, and his understanding of 




10 THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 


the politico-religious psychology of the American 
people, and of their ideals of democracy, as handed 
down by the Puritan ministers in their ‘Election 
Sermons’ from the earliest times until the adoption 
of the Constitution of the United States. 

“Paine’s argument on the birth of democracy is 
drawn from the ‘Hebrew Commonwealth.’ He 
says: ‘Monarchy is ranked in scripture as one of the 
sins of the Jews, for which a curse in reserve is 
denounced against them.’ ‘All anti-monarchical 
parts of scripture have been very smoothly glossed 
over in monarchical governments, but they un¬ 
doubtedly merit the attention of countries which 
have their governments yet to form,’ . . . Paine 

goes on to the introduction of Saul as king: ‘But 
where, say some, is the king of America? I’ll tell 
you, friend, he reigns above, and doth not make 
havoc of mankind like the royal brute of Britain.’ 

“ ‘Common Sense’ had been published anonym¬ 
ously—‘Written by An Englishman’—and the au- 




THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 11 


thorship had been ascribed, among others, to Frank¬ 
lin, who was then in England. At a reception in 
the British capital, Franklin was reproached for the 
reference to ‘the royal brute of Britain.’ The diplo¬ 
mat disavowed his authorship and blandly added 
T never could have alluded so disparagingly to the 
brute creation!’ 

“Continuing his dissertation on the Flebrew 
Commonwealth Paine says: ‘Yet that we may not 
appear to be defective even in earthly honors, let a 
day be set apart for proclaiming the charter; let it 
be brought forth placed on the divine law, the word 
of God; let a crown be placed thereon by which the 
world may know that, so far as we approve of 
monarchy, in America the law is king. The Jews, 
elated with success, and attributing it to the gen¬ 
eralship of Gideon, proposed making him king, say¬ 
ing : ‘Rule thou over us, thou and thy son; and thy 
son’s son.’ ‘I will not rule over you, neither shall 
my son rule over you; the Lord shall rule over you.’ 





12 THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 



THOMAS PAINE 

Portrait by Charles Willson Pcale 
Philadelphia, 1777 











































THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 13 


Gideon doth not decline the honor, but denieth the 
right to give it.’ Paine then proceeds to the scrip¬ 
tural narrative concerning the people demanding a 
king, about one hundred years after this period, 
under Samuel, and quoting in full Samuel’s admon¬ 
itions, concludes in these words: ‘These portions of 
the scriptures are direct and positive; they admit 
of no equivocal construction. That the Almighty 
hath here entered his protest against monarchical 
government is true, or the scriptures are false.’ 

“When first I began independently to study 
American history and the origin of American dem¬ 
ocracy, two outstanding contributors who have made 
not only America, but the world their debtors, 
aroused my special interest and sympathetic ad¬ 
miration for their moral courage and visioned fore¬ 
sight because of which they were maligned and per¬ 
secuted in their generation and their transcendent 
services obscured and belittled for years thereafter. 
I refer to Roger Williams, the pioneer of religious 




14 THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 


liberty, who was the first to found a political com¬ 
munity with Church and State separated. The other 
was Thomas Paine, who was the first to advocate 
American Independence and our form of represen¬ 
tative democracy. Though the period which sep¬ 
arated the services of these two great founders of 
American religious and civil liberty, is more than 
one hundred and fifty years, the reasons they 
aroused bitter opposition and incurred malice which 
obscured their imperishable services were, if not 
identical, very much akin. 

“Paine in his ‘Age of Reason/ because of his 
vigorous attack upon priestcraft, was traduced as 
an Atheist, though his Deism differed but little, if 
at all, from the religious beliefs of Washington, 
Franklin, Jefferson, Adams, Hamilton and Madi¬ 
son. Roger Williams was, too, a profoundly re¬ 
ligious man, who advocated with unswerving con¬ 
sistency and moral courage his conviction that the 
civil magistrate should have no power over the 




THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 15 


conscience and religious beliefs of the citizen. He 
founded his community upon the basis of a ‘free 
Church in a free State’—our American system. 

“Like Thomas Paine he was condemned by the 
ecclesiastics of his time and was characterized by 
them as a stubborn heretic and a disturber of the 
civil peace. The early historians, Morton, Mather, 
Hubbard and others wrote against him with a 
prejudiced pen. The enmities he encountered had 
such vitality that they were handed down evi t to 
our day. 

“Paine’s ‘Common Sense’ prepared the public 
mind for Independence and presented some of the 
outstanding reasons which were embodied in the 
Declaration of Independence, which was adopted 
six months thereafter. And Paine’s labors did not 
end there. The first number of his ‘Crisis’ which 
was written by the camp-fires of the Revolution 
when the little army was hurled from Long Island, 
drove away despondency and buoyed up the spirits 




16 THOMAS PA'iNE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 


of the soldiers. His pamphlet, by the order of 
Washington, was read at the head of each regi¬ 
ment. This number contained the historic and 
thrilling words: ‘These are the times that try men’s 
souls.’ Succeeding numbers, thirteen in all, ap¬ 
peared during the trying periods of the war. The 
last number, which appeared on April 19, 1783, be¬ 
gan with the sentence: ‘The times that tried men’s 
souls are over.’ 

“Time does not permit me to dwell upon the great 
services Paine rendered to liberty and humanity, 
and the marvelous influence of his convincing logic 
clothed in flaming words. His humanitarianism 
never shone brighter than, after aiding in battering 
down kingship in France, he heroically came for¬ 
ward, as a member of the Assembly, to defend the 
life of the king, Louis XVI, for which he was 
thrown into prison and narrowly escaped death by 
the guillotine. I cannot conclude my remarks more 
appropriately than by quoting Monroe’s estimate 




THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 17 


of Paine’s services as set forth in his letter to Paine 
of September 18, 1794, referring to his efforts to 
secure his release from prison in the Luxembourg: 
‘It is not necessary for me to tell you how much all 
your countrymen—I speak of the great mass of the 
people—are interested in your welfare. . . . 

You are considered by them as not only having ren¬ 
dered important services in our own Revolution, 
but as being, on a more extensive scale, the friend 
of human rights and a distinguished and able advo¬ 
cate in favor of public liberty. To the welfare of 
Thomas Paine the Americans are not, nor can they 
be, indifferent.’ 

“The Thomas Paine National Plistorical Associa¬ 
tion is rendering no small patriotic service in paying 
just tribute to the memory of the first—and most— 
convincing advocate of our country’s independence 
and the soul-stirring apostle of Democracy, Liberty 
and Humanity in France, England and America.” 





18 THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 



The old Paine house on Bleecker Street—still standing— 
where Thomas Paine lived during the last year of his life. 











THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 19 


The following report of the dinner in commem¬ 
oration of the 184th anniversary of Paine's birth, 
at which Mr. Straus delivered the foregoing ad¬ 
dress, is from the columns of The Truth Seeker 

(N. Y.). 

With sufficient reasons the Thomas Paine Na¬ 
tional Historical Association may regard this year’s 
Paine dinner as the most successful that society 
has ever held in the city of New York. As many 
guests as could be seatecl in the capacious dining¬ 
room of the Cafe Boulevard, where the Sunrise 
Club meets, were present; and it was a gathering 
that might be called brilliant. For the principal 
speaker, there was a diplomat, who had been ambas¬ 
sador extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary at 
a European capital, as well as member of a Presi¬ 
dent’s cabinet. The Hon. Oscar S. Straus was fol¬ 
lowed by Mrs. William Vanamee, secretary and act¬ 
ing director of the Hall of Fame, whose vote would 
have put Paine in that distinguished company could 




20 THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 


it have been effectively cast; and by the successor 
to that eminent Unitarian minister, the late John 
White Chadwick, the Rev. Charles H. Lyttle of the 
Second Unitarian church of Brooklyn, from whose 
pulpit the name and fame of Paine have been an¬ 
nounced since the year 1870. Mr. Straus in the 
course of his address recalled that some years ago, 
when he spoke before a historical society in Brook¬ 
lyn, and cited the tributes of the Fathers of the Re¬ 
public to the foremost constructive statesman of 
their day, several local clergymen arose to protest 
that they had not come there to listen to a lauda¬ 
tion of Thomas Paine. Mr. Lyttle stated that his 
predecessor, Dr. Chadwick, could not have been one 
of those ministers. Mrs. Vanamee, whose associa¬ 
tions and antecedents are perhaps not so liberal as 
those of Mr. Lyttle, said nevertheless that Paine 
was the Apostle of Freedom and the prophet of the 
great free-hearted America of today that is feeding 
the world from its bounty. President van der 




Thomas eaine, foremost statesman 21 


Weyde in his felicitous remarks from the chair 
spoke of the pleasure it gave him to note that among 
the guests was a grandson of Gilbert Vale, the first 
authentic biographer of Paine in America. The 
name of this grandson was not disclosed, but he is 
a resident of Brooklyn, and his mother was Gil¬ 
bert Vale’s daughter. Greetings from George 
Seibel and the Pittsburgh celebrants were read, with 
a cablegram from a Spanish editor, who addressed 
the President of the Paine Association as Senor 
Don van der Weyde. It was perhaps the most 
memorable gathering in the name of the author of 
the “Age of Reason” since the guns roared at New 
Rochelle when the monument there was delivered 
over to the custody of that town and accepted by 
the mayor. It was an occasion for congratulation 
on the success of the Painites, the Freethinkers, who 
have rescued Paine’s name from the obloquy and 
oblivion to which orthodoxy assigned it and given 
it over to the applause of so representative, even 




22 THOMAS PAINE, FOREMOST STATESMAN 


distinguished, a group of citizens of the Republic 
that the Author-Hero of the Revolution did so 
much to create. 

The annual meeting of the Thomas Paine 
National Historical Association was held at the 
Cafe Boulevard an hour before the dinner. Presi¬ 
dent van der Weyde occupied the chair. The 


following officers were unanimously re-elected: 

President .William M. van der Weyde 

ist Vicc-Pres’t .Woolsey Teller 

2 n4 Vice-Prcs’t .Marshall J. Gauvin 

Treasurer .William H. Harvey 

Recording Sec’y .William Brenner 

Corresponding Scc’y . Dr. T. J. Bowles 









A CORDIAL invitation is extended to 
all persons interested in Thomas 
Paine and his great labors for the 
benefit of humanity to become members 
of the Thomas Paine National Historical 
Association, an organization incorporated 
under the laws of the State of New York 
for the purpose of increasing the public’s 
knowledge and appreciation of Paine and 
his works. The Association has opened a 
Thomas Paine National Museum at the 
Paine house in New Rochelle on the farm 
that was presented to Paine*by the State 
of New York in recognition of his services 
before and during the Revolutionary War. 
A dinner in honor of Paine is given each 
year upon each anniversary of the birth 
of Thomas Paine. All persons interested 
in the objects of this Association should 
communicate with the Secretary, Thomas 
Paine National Historical Association, 62 
Vesey Street, New York. There are no 
initiation fees, and the dues are only one 
dollar a year. 



“Nothing can settle our 
affairs so expeditiously as a 
declaration for independ¬ 
ence. . . . ‘The UNITED 
STATES OF AMERICA’ 
will sound as pompously in 
the world and in history as 
‘the kingdom of Great Bri¬ 
tain.’ ”—THOMAS PAINE. 











